


Kiss of Life (This Sweet Pool is Everblue)

by JenovaVII



Series: almost turning changes nothing; turning changes everything [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Banter, Bonding, Developing Relationship, Episode Tag, Episode: s02e04 Abomination, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Humor, M/M, Near Death Experience, Pop Culture, Pre-Slash, Slow Build, Stiles Stilinski Accepts The Bite, Stiles' POV, Swimming Pools, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-27
Updated: 2012-10-27
Packaged: 2017-11-17 04:30:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/547630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenovaVII/pseuds/JenovaVII
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Canon-AU for 2x04) "Yeah, kiss of life, d'you want me to say it in another language, Derek? Latin would be cool but I'm still not fluent yet so how about Spanish? Spanish worked on Jackson before. Beso de vida."</p><p>In which: Scott isn't even lethally late—he simply doesn't show up at all. Stiles does the saving and things railroad from there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kiss of Life (This Sweet Pool is Everblue)

 

Stiles takes a bit more time calling Scott than he thought he would. It rang and rang and rang and Stiles almost got whiplash (this time for real) from splashing around so much to get an eye on the freaking giant lizard at all times. And when Scott had finally picked up his piece of crap phone? He'd completely dismissed Stiles in the same second.

Un-fucking-believable.

So they are on their own. Him and Derek. Once again. With no else to count on but each other. Stiles doesn't have time to focus all his attention on being angry at Scott while staring at the mobile screen, so he gives a last grudging look at his phone and doesn't even kiss it good-bye, bad-bye, either-bye, before taking in a pull of air and diving into the water.

It has been too long, Stiles knows, but he hopes Derek has awesome lungs, like Olympics' swimming athlete-like lungs and hasn't dropped the boot yet. Stiles is not going to have to snivel and beg his dad for a new phone for a wet dog's cadaver. _He is not._

Stiles keeps slapping and kicking the water until he can reach for Derek's clothes and pulls Derek up to him, gets his arms around him and springs back up with the impulse of a foot.

On the same instant he's pulled Derek above water for much deserved and belated air, Stiles feels something is _wrong_. Derek's already unconscious. Stiles starts threading water to the nearest edge of the pool and can't stop the words from spilling all the while, "Holy fuck _shit_ hell damnit crap, _Derek_ ," and as he does tiny amounts of water wave back and forth, in and out of his mouth.

The reptile thing isn't anywhere to be seen, hasn't been since just before Stiles had dived and caught a shadow of a tail disappearing through a fend. He hadn't spared a glance at Erica to see if she was still lying knocked-out but he can see her now, still unmoving, as he drags Derek's body out of the swimming pool.

Tucking two fingers beneath Derek's jaw, Stiles feels for the flow of blood there, still throbbing albeit in a slow tandem. Too slow. Then he puts his palm to Derek's nose and feels for air influx. Nothing. _Fuck_.

As he kneels at Derek's side Stiles puts both his hands, already joined in a tight grip, above the motionless chest and startes pumping in a steady rhythm, unafraid of using the force necessary. When CPR's well done it's not unusual breaking a rib or two and that's on ordinary people therefore Stiles has no qualms about wrecking the whole rib cage of a were-fucking-wolf, if it gets his respiratory system back _on_. He stops, pinches Derek's nose, holds his mouth open and breathes into him.

Stiles is un-fatigable as he repeats the procedure a number of times, timing the compressions in his head. He's getting slightly out of breath himself but wills his alveolus to overcome the hurt and is bending to begin another round when Derek's head starts shaking up, his throat bobbing and pulsing little squirts of water out.

The relief is immediate and distinguishable in Stiles' voice as he whispers roughly, "Heeeeyy, De... rek. Glad to, uh, see you. Well. Alive. Yes." He'd move to help Derek out the rest of way into expulsing the unwanted liquid but, erm. Boundaries. Seems stupid thinking about that _now_ , but. Derek's awake now. Which means: in active state to maim and kill at any suspicious movement.

Still on the "boundaries" topic... Derek sure has a strange way to go about it. Stiles doesn't know what kind of reasoning is his while he touches-paws-handles Stiles in diverse forms and capacities and then gives Stiles the "I'll kill you" glare whenever Stiles is the one to put a hand to his shoulder or something. Jesus. Stiles genuinely can't believe he's still alive after all the face-touching and face-punching right when they'd first met, thinking back on it.

And then Derek also doesn't look even slightly troubled at the prospect of using Stiles' clothes. He's strikingly non-plussed about getting all in Stiles' space and belongings as if all those things (and person) belonged _to him_. Which is a startling thought right there. When it's the other way around however...

Hoooly _God_.

"Stiles..." Derek croaks.

Yikes! The way Derek pronounces the consonants of his name—not really his 'real first name' name—is vaguely deadly. Like a foggy version of the usual level of aggressiveness.

(...Forget the vaguely, dude. Deadly _is all_ it sounds like.)

"Before fangs come out, please remember how I carried your dead-weight for over two hours, kept you from drowning, kept you from _dying_ , okay? Okay."

"How about the part where you let go of my _not dead_ weight and dumped me to sink to the bottom of the pool? Want me to remember that too?"

Oh-ho, the usual post-near death experience sarcasm. That means Derek's fine, they're cool, it lives! Stiles has an itch— _is itching_ to bicker back but he's also dying to go home and strip out of this chlorine-soaked track suit.

"Nnooo...? See, that is totally not how it was, you're distorting reality, making it sound like I did it for fun, for the kicks, on purpose, to get you killed. Which is absolutely untrue, wrong, _oh_ the sin of it! I was trying to save us, you know, from the friendly crouching greeny that poked you in the neck—well, not so friendly, actually not friendly at all, he was a dick. A dick of a lizard. Metaphorically. Not literally. The lizard didn't like, poke your neck with his dick or anything—"

"Stop. Talking," Derek grunts has he starts getting up.

"Sorry, I'm ssooo sorry." He's not. "I'm sorry for putting our mouths together, for not respecting your personal space—because hello, you always respect mine, right? No slamming into walls or steering wheels or nose-touching or man-wolf-handling or window-hoping or clothes-sharing of any kind, nuh-huh, it's all the fruit of my extremely fertile imagination, yep, no doubt—"

Derek hauls Stiles by the turtle-neck (oh, here we go—o!) and whams their foreheads together.

It hurts like a freaking _bitch_.

" _Ouch_! Motherfuck—"

"I told you. To shut. That mouth. Up."

"See what I mean? We're breathing the same air here. More like breathing each other's carbon dioxide, which is not good, buddy, I'm telling you. No healthy oxygen anymore and—oh wow, okay, nice teeth there, great teeth, _amazing_ teeth, please tell me which dentist do you frequent because—"

Derek glares extra hard, same price. Must be promotion week.

Sucking his lips in a bit, Stiles hisses softly, "Shutting up now, yeah. Shut up, Stiles. Stiles has now shut up, up shut, up—"

While Stiles rambled he didn't move but he _has_ been moved. Stiles knows that because BD ( _i.e._  Before Derek) he'd been vertically standing and AD ( _i.e_. After Derek) he is now lying horizontally.

"—Uh."

Derek's crushing their bodies one against the other on the ground, pining Stiles immobile. They're soaked, soaked to the bone, clothes gluing to flesh, heavy and moist; water pooling around them, creating a mini-pool. Stiles is not in the mood for more pools. Stiles will not be in the mood for pools for a long, long time. No matter the form of the pool, the depth nor if the content is either sweet or salt water.

It's sticky and uncomfortable and hot and there's this droplet about to fall from Derek's lip right into Stiles' open mouth and Stiles has _not_ followed said droplet as it peeked out from Derek's spiky dark hair and rounded his human ears, his high cheek bone and ended up settling like morning dew on his lower lip, awaiting its fall.

And it _does_ fall. Stiles can't help it, his lips were already parted and his mouth slacks just that bit more (because: oral fixation) to ensure the drop would hit its target of its own accord. Wasting water is a terrible thing to do. Lack of subsistence resources and the Greenhouse effect and the Ozone hole and all that. With children dying of thirst in Third World countries there's no way Stiles is letting a single and so important droplet of water become worthless on the concrete floor. Strictly selfless, altruistic reasoning. Nothing else.

Stiles swallows it. And then his eyes fly open. Stiles was already mentally praying Derek hadn't caught on what he'd just done but then, as soon as he opened his eyes, he squeezed them back shut _immediately_. Because that wide-eyed look on Derek's beautiful face? (Wait, what, _beautiful_? Uh, _no._ ) That look Is not a look of someone who hasn't just witnessed something unexpected, shocking, what-the-fuck-ery.

Oh God, he's gonna die. Stiles is going to die, Derek is going to rip him apart, totally. Starting by his tongue, undoubtedly. Tongue which didn't know better than give the non-stop yapping a break and _stay_ inside the cavity of Stiles' mouth instead of becoming the harbinger of disaster. Any time now.

Come! Stiles screams mentally, trying to convince himself more than anything else, and referring to himself in the 3rd person for no special reason. Stiles' body is ready!

As ready as it'll ever be to welcome its demise— Oh holy mother of all mothers, Stiles doesn't want to fucking _die_ so please, _please_ Derek, have some mercy, thanks.

As if it's not enough that Stiles has planted a purely technical, open-mouthed (for air exchange purposes only!) stamp of lips on the guy to blow into him and inflate his lungs, now he'd blatantly, indirectly sorta kissed him a second time (hint: artificial respiration as a whole counts as the other one). Without his consent (again). Through freaking _water_.

Things are looking dim—very, very dim—in Stiles' direction, in Stiles' unforeseen future (or in the non-existence of said future), if the blood-red glow of Derek's eyes is anything to navigate by. And it's a thing—a good thing—to navigate by. Better than high-tech GPS. Which, _shit on a stick_ , Stiles is so _screwed_. And not in the white, messy way, no, but in the scarlet. Messy. Way.

What luck is his? Diagnosed with ADHD since what, forever? Scrawny, weak body—which, okay, not really. Stiles is tall and he's got long limbs and decent, wiry muscles in development. Also, a pretty strong grip, taking into account everything—everyone—he's had to support lately. Nerdy. Not a bad thing, actually; being resourceful and having quick-fingers on the keyboard plus quick-thinking on the idea-box is a _gift._  Missing brain-to-mouth filter ( _honesty_ , radical honesty is a great quality to possess, sometimes. And can be a bitch, some other times; 'cause a person has to know when to shut up and not spill certain things out to certain people. Werewof-people. Who are scary, very scary, and mean, and a-w-e-s-o-m-e. Freaking awesome and cool and are his _friends_ , oh _yeah_.)

What else? No, really, what else is there, what else does he need, what else will be thrust at him, into his arms tomorrow morning while he's still snoring through breakfast?! (Now, wouldn't _you_ like to be The Stiles, huh?)

Back to the situation at hand! Stiles, on the bottom, Derek, on top, intense eye-stare, tension to cut with a knife. None of it in any way sexual. Nooeess.

The lightbulb goes _pliim_ and Stiles goes for hopelessly grateful for his, uh, dear, um, acquaintance Derek being all safe and sound and bulky (not too bulky, just _riiigght_ —oh my _God_ , what.)

It's the immensity of water, it's making Stiles' brain all furled and furly like it did to his finger-heads. He blinks and gasps, "Oh thank God, thought you were a goner for a second there, man," with a bit of unneeded articulations.

Not one of the dozens of muscles on Derek's face move (how does he even _do_ that?!) when he casually says, "Unfortunately for you, it seems not."

Stiles does a double-take, because: "...I'm sorry? I think I got too much water in my ears because I'm not listening too well. Why the hell would I risk getting a slashing by those pretty fangs if I wanted your ass dead, you enormous dick! There's a little thing called saying a fucking thank you when someone saves your useless Alpha corpse from the bottom of the ocean!"

And yes, Stiles is the first to point out the tremendous exaggerating he's doing there but he had to watch _Titanic_ some nights ago with his father on his mom's birthday. So.

"Actually, seeing as I'm a tiny little weakling of a human and I just keep on struggling to keep your cold-stoned heart beating you should kneel at my feet and idolize me like the majestic awesomeness that I am, okay?"

Derek's nostrils dilate a millimeter and his jaw tightens.

"Careful Stiles," he warns with a snarl. "Just because you're actually helpful from time to time and compensate your best friend's stupid, hormone-driven behavior doesn't mean you've got a bite-free pass card."

After putting some space between them, Derek gets up again. He keeps his eyes on Stiles as he approaches Erica and texts Boyd from her phone for him to come and get his sleeping beauty.

Stiles is up on his own feet by the time Derek resolves to carry on talking. He's being awfully talkative, is one of Stiles' observations. The other observation is that Derek has told one of his pups to come get the other but... what about Derek himself?

"Listen well, you're more valuable to me alive but don't stretch the rubber band too much. The rebound will come, eventually, and then it'll..." Derek walks to Stiles with his stalk-walk, gets all on Stiles' turf, dark and heavy.

" _Snap_." The sudden movement Derek makes with his head is so dog-like Stiles can't take the threatening seriously—at least not in its entirety.

Derek has rescued Stiles from certain-death as many times as Stiles has saved Derek. No matter how much the werewolf keeps going for the aggressive-aggressive approach to everything, getting Stiles to work with him under false pretenses like black-mail...

Pretenses that are, ultimately, fake. The fake- _est_ of the fake.

Stiles doesn't drive around town with Derek by his side because looky: claws! Okay, _maybe_ he does it a little bit because of that but it's only really just a little bit, like the tiniest fraction imaginary, or rather un-imaginary—the unknown is much vaster, broader than what's already acknowledged in reality.

Stiles does it because usually Scott is somehow thrown into the whole mess and needs help despite _never wanting to have anything_ _ **to do with anything**_ and whenever the pack—pack? _No_ ,they're not a 'pack.' And even if they were, Stiles is certainly not in _Derek_ 's pack. Ugh, anyway, whenever the, um, gang? Yeah, whenever the gang splits up, he and Derek get automatically— _randomly_ , totally at random, Stiles berates himself until it sticks believably—paired up.

"I bet that's what you want. I bet you'd like that, wouldn't you, Derek? Bet you've thought about it, about..." Stiles says, clearly snide and spiteful and being a provoking little shit; he knows its an easy state for him to get to but Derek— Derek _squishes_ that nasty part of his personality out _without even trying_.

He's pulled the zipper down and now he's raking the red jacket and the shirt he was wearing under it up as he continues, "...attaching those pointy canines of yours, right here, on my side. _Turning me_."

Derek's eyes morph steadily to vermilion.

"For once you'd have someone reliable—"

"Who ever said you're reliable," Derek scoffs. It's an ugly sound, accompanied by an ever uglier twist of the mouth; dismissing Stiles' mere existence as nothing more than a constant eyesore.

" _You_ did, Derek," Stiles replies easily even though Derek hasn't used proper interrogative punctuation. That little attempt of Derek's does nothing to deter Stiles. In fact, it only serves to spur him on further.

"You'd have someone who'd answer your calls and not ditch your pain-or-death situation just to get some. Sure, I'd say, 'Like hell,' and talk a lot of colorful vocabulary back at you, but in the end I'd grit my teeth, call myself stupid for even giving a damn and I'd go as fast as I could," Stiles continues without missing half a beat, spewing out words, one after the other.

"Someone who wouldn't defend the Hunters every. Single. Time, regardless of their continued attempts to eradicate our—your, _your_ kind. Someone you trust—"

"I don't trust _anyone,_ " Derek dissects immediately, his voice flat, but the tightness of his mouth tells Stiles every secret.

Stiles sneers, contorts his nose. "That's bull and you know it. Dude, _I_ know it and I've got no super-hero powers whatsoever. Aside from my innate capacity to be imposingly awesome in any situation, at any time, in any place, of course," he gloats playfully and then adds a punch of self-glorification with a Lydia Martin™ flick of the wrist.

" _You trust me_. Admit it, Derek. Admit you trust me not to let you die, not to let you down, not you let you... not to let you on your own."

"Aren't you getting this ahead of yourself just because I've thrust an electric saw at you once and told you to cut off my arm? Next time I'll wait for a person less likely to get the wrong impression _even as I get closer to dying by the hour_ ," says Derek, as if it's no big deal. "That way you won't misunderstand things anymore."

"Ha ha, don't break your brain trying to be funny or anything. And _please_ , that's not even—that was just the freaking gun shot start, if anything. Don't you get it, dude, you... you put your trust in me and you don't even acknowledge it, do you? Seriously, it's like it's something... I don't know. Unquestionable for you."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Derek tells Stiles as he walks away. "And you are clearly more out of your very busy mind that usual. Did you miss your daily paranoia-control pills today?" Derek asks with an air of impatience and half-baked animosity that rubs on anger.

Anger at what? At Stiles being so wrong it makes him more idiotic at Derek's eyes than he already was? Or because everything Stiles had said had been dead-on and _that_ 's what caused Derek to look like a chimney with a chubby Santa stuck inside about to burst?

Stiles licks his lips and smiles a tentative smile. "I'm right, aren't I?" he asks, growing confident. "How do you even know about my ADHD, Derek? You've jumped through my window a lot, sure, but it's not like I leave my medication all over the place like I do books and all my other shit."

They're out of the school building and Stiles can't stop talking now, he's _getting_ _somewhere_ with this.

"And I sure as hell don't remember sharing my medical history with you. Did you research me, Derek? Were you, what, curious? Concerned? Do you actually have the 'command' to _care_?"

Derek growls and Stiles lifts a foot on instinct to take a step back but sucks a deep breath, like the old vacuum cleaner at home. He puts his foot back where it had been and stands his ground.

"Answer me this one thing then. Don't lie. I can't actually tell by heartbeats like you can, so. Give me your word you won't lie."

Derek snorts, when he speaks it's a dry sound. "And you'll what, Stiles? Believe what I say, believe I'll keep my word?"

Stiles looks at him and says, "Yeah, I will," without a second thought and he knows, when Derek's eyes burst impossibly round, that his pulse has conveyed his truthfulness. Stiles remains still, awaiting a response in silence (state your intention and then let it simmer as the wild animal decides to take or not the next step; if Harry can do it then Stiles can do it,) and when Derek nods tightly Stiles exhales in relief, doesn't try to cover it.

"When I let you go, on the pool. To get to my cell," Stiles says as a means of an introductory piece and Derek blinks, straightening his back. "Did you doubt I'd come back? Did you— _even for one second—_ think I'd leave you there to drown?" Stiles leaks out, quick-fire speed. He's moving in the same place earnestly with lots of twitching fingers.

Derek pursues his lips. He looks to the side, away from Stiles. Must be picturing it in his mind; watching the pool, watching the still water, the missing ripples.

"Derek," Stiles calls, calls him _back_.

Derek huffs and then looks back at him, looks Stiles straight in his two amber eyes and curls his arms around his chest in a cross, imposing and stubborn and looking like Stiles is the one threatening him now, with wolfsbane or a high-voltage Taser, making him do something against his will.

God, the dude is such a child.

"No," Derek mutters and it sounds like thunder.

Stiles' mouth is fighting between a grin and gapping, actually astonished at Derek for being frank and thrilled for having made the right assumptions and God, had that been a leap of faith. He'd said all the crap he could think of that would get under Derek's skin and at the same time give him some answers in return. Answers for something Stiles had been pondering over for some time but had not arranged irrefutable proof of.

But he does now, from the source even. Derek's admission is the pinnacle of irrefutable proof. It had also thrown Stiles on a loop, that single-word-of-one-syllable admission. And what a loop. A wow-loop.

I mean, Stiles' brain tells himself, the grumpiest wolf-man to ever howl at the moon, who has more personal and social issues than anyone Stiles could think of had actually chosen _him_ —sixteen plus years of unbidden energy and addiction to curly fries—to create a bond of trust with. Mutual trust. Derek has to know that, that it goes both ways. Stiles is so totally gonna make sure of that. 'Cause this? This is actually more than awesome. Stiles doesn't use the expression "more than awesome" lightly, ma frends.

"That's—good! That's really good. Really! Um, I, was so not expecting you to be so quick and cooperative, uh, so. Wait, I definitely have a speech somewhere to inaugurate-commemorate-ate this new stage of our... _ss_. Our, uh, thing. Relationship. It's not a friendship yet, of that I'm pretty sure, but I'm also equally sure it is a ship. Of some kind. A partnership! That! We're definitely that. Partners," Stiles finishes, happy with himself and his brilliance in the art of dialogue—

Tch, right. More like his brilliant capacity of digging himself deeper into the hole.

Scrabbling to get the word-vomit back on track, Stiles re-startes, "In the working-together-against-the-forces-of-evil parters sense, not the same-sex-partners-for-life sense! I mean—you know what I mean! Ugh, kill me now— _no_ , don't actually _end_ me, just..." Stiles sighs, defeated.

"Make me shut up? Before I throw our recent development to the waste?"

Derek puffs a laugh. _A laugh_. Derek does. As in ruefully finding something amusing and deserving enough of an expression of amusement from his part; finding _Stiles_ amusing (and not only an idiot—an annoying, parrot, idiot with actual functioning neurons).

Isn't _this_ going well? Stiles contemplates thoughtfully. Derek's display of not-so-bad-a-mood makes him a bit woozy.

"I do," Derek says suddenly and Stiles has no idea what the dude 'does', or 'did.' Both. Either. Context, anyone? Please?

Derek knows a thing or two—quite a few, actually—about sarcasm. He likes, or at least seems to find it life-accomplishing, to snap at Stiles with it. The majority of those times when Stiles is either about to, is in the middle of, or has just saved his butt.

Derek needs _help_. Lots. Because he has _issues_. Lots.

Especially a lesson on how to treat people (the person) who keeps _keeping him alive_ is needed. Stiles might recommend him to visit Ms. Morrell some day. Soon. She's pretty, she's smart and she knows her French. Might as well give her a try at giving Derek some pointers on how to live in society.

Stiles swears he cannot understand all the anti-social behavior. The gloominess and inability to bond with others after having lost his loved ones and been betrayed in such a horrible way is one thing, Stiles does understand that, he doesn't lack sensibility to such a point; he's lost his mother too, it's hard, really hard. But people have to _deal_. That's what they _do_. The creeping around on the shadows though, and being _everywhere_ and all that violence—violence that is mostly a mask. And for someone who's a born predator... it being a mask is generally not the norm.

Derek has, literally, been raised by wolves, true. _But not_ _ **only**_ wolves. There were humans in his pack, a decent number of them. For as long as Derek keeps on dodging a confrontation with his demons, as long as he doesn't go head-to-head with the ghosts of his dead pack members and doesn't let go of a bag of guilt so gigantic, a guilt that isn't even—it was _not._  His. Fault.

 _It's not your fault, you big ball of fur!_ Stiles wants to yell at him, hammer it down _down_ _**down**_ on that thick skull of Derek's until it enters and has the effect Stiles wants it to have.

And anyway, if Derek's that good at being a sarcastic dickwad he must be aware of what the concept of context is, right? To contextualize. It's not that difficult a thing to do, yeah?

Stiles is about to ask for some enlightenment, because he's really starting to feel the cold now (no, he's not 'getting cold feet') and yeah, he did forget to take his Adderall but he's not about to give a certain wolf one more reason for growly smugness.

Stiles inflates his chest and opens his mouth and the one who talks is Derek. Derek who speaks as if he's being one-handedly choked. Like it physically pains him to tell someone what goes on inside. "I wonder about what it would have been like, if Peter had bitten you in the woods instead of Scott. You've already got the brain mostly right, switched wiring aside—"

"Hey!" Indignant! Stiles is!

"—now imagine the combination of added power. I'd have taught you all about the basics of self-control and you... you'd just _get it_. And you wouldn't freaking shut up. You'd talk and annoy the life out of me and you'd be strong but you'd be smart and controlled about it too. Wild, absolutely, yet you'd know what limits not to cross."

Indignation? What's that? Stiles is utterly awe-struck. Someone come and slap him or pinch him (Allison preferably, because she'd be a bit sweeter and dimply-smiles while Lydia would be sadistic-sexy like a Dominatrix which is, um, HOT—but! Not what's in question here!). This isn't Derek. Derek's been abducted. By aliens. This is a pod-person. A pod-wolf.

(...Can this Derek-clone-being even wolf-out?)

Aaannd Derek completely disregards Stiles' internal breakdown and keeps on opening the gash. "I can almost bet there would be no need to put you on lock-down on your first Full Moon. You'd be running through the woods without a single claw straining to slip out. Just gazing at the moonlight before going home to tell you father goodnight and get stuffed full of cakes or whatever it is you do. Homework, I guess," he says.

"And you'd make _me_ so strong, Stiles. You're clearly the best option among all the troubled teenagers in Beacon Hills but that isn't anything you're not already sick of knowing—that _I'm_ sick of knowing. That _Peter_ knew the moment he set eyes on you. He asked you, didn't he. Offered you the bite. You refused it, obviously, or else you wouldn't smell of pure, unadulterated humanity anymore."

"That's not... quite right." Stiles clears his throat. "I... I didn't _refuse the bite_ though that's how I made it sound like, I—Peter, he saw through me anyway, heh. I just rejected _him_. I didn't want to be bitten by him, who'd forced the wolf on Scott and attacked Lydia and killed all those people. Even if it was rightfully deserved vengeance. I get it, I do, but he was the one who killed your sister too. I know he wasn't himself completely, not really, not anymore, but. He slaughtered the guilty _and_ the innocent and that—I didn't want to get bit by him and _become_ like him, I—I couldn't, I _can't_. Living with that would be... unbearable."

Derek's eyes narrow and he snaps a low and quiet "You would _never_ be like him," and then he schools his features at the pick-up of Stiles' heart rate before starting to smirk.

"Right," he drawls. "Because it's not like you don't actually long for the bite."

Stiles swallows nothingness of the size of his jeep conglomerated inside his throat.

"You just didn't want it from _him_. That's what you said, Stiles."

Stiles inclines his head immediately. Swallowing dry again, he rolls his shoulder backwards to hear it crackling the stress out.

Derek walks to him. His voice is his normal tone now but it doesn't have the familiar tinge of exasperation or anger or teasing. "Do you still want it, Stiles? You want the bite? Who..." The last part uttered isn't so much a question and Derek's eyes go steadily red again. It's fascinating, Stiles thinks, watching it crawl from pale green and grow hot fire.

"From a wolf I trust, not a psychotic one even if he claims to 'like' me, whatever the hell he meant with that." Derek's jaw works something fierce and Stiles thinks maybe _Derek knows_ or has a faint idea what Peter had meant. "And not from a Beta who doesn't even want to be a werewolf, my best buddy or not."

The rest goes unsaid.

—

There are no cars parked near the Stilinski house as it comes into view.

Derek and Stiles get out of the Camaro and out of the jeep, respectively, and as Stiles rounds the key and opens the door he can't stop the snicker at how laughable the situation is. This is actually the first time Derek's coming inside his house through an actual door.

They communicate quickly and flatly and soon they've both taken turns at taking warm showers (Derek shaves! Stiles doesn't remember having seen Derek's bare face since the first couple of weeks after he and Scott had gone looking for Scott's asthma inhaler. Good times those, when walks in the woods didn't come with werewolves attached to a person's hip—literally.) And, soon after that, they are re-dressed in sweatshirts and pants of Stiles'. The clothes are naturally cotton-comfortable and don't swirl around Derek's musculature like clingy plastic gloves, so the guy's got nothing to complain about this time.

Stiles falls back on his duvet, arms spread and legs ajar, so Derek takes the iniciative to rekindle where they had left off. Stiles' eyes are closed when he feels the bed dipping as Derek plops gracefully down by his side and then listens to the quite pleasant tone of Derek's voice. Now that Stiles actually takes proper notice it's a nice voice; not rough, as it would be expected of Derek's appearance, but a mid-low current of sounds, clearly enunciated and punctured with soft, huskier highs. It contrasts _so much_ with Derek's wolfed-out growl.

"You'd be part of my pack," Derek informs him, accentuating the consequences.

Stiles gets it now. Derek may have sort of 'seduced' Issac, Erica and Boyd into getting turned but he didn't force them. Stiles had been unconvinced that Derek had really let them in on everything beforehand—told them about the Hunters and all the dangers that it would expose them to. But each of the new werewolves had stood by Derek, declaring they were well aware of what they had gotten themselves into. Derek who had made sure it was what they wanted before biting them. Derek who would never turn anyone against their will.

At Stiles' silence—which is in itself a highly improbable thing to occur—Derek gives him a light kick on the foot that dangled from the end of the mattress. "Wouldn't you want Scott to be your Alpha?"

Stiles looks at him briefly and then squints. "Even if I did it's not like he's an Alpha, so. Being bitten by him lad to nothing but werewolf chow. Besides, Scott would never do it. You know how he feels about being a werewolf."

After a fight with his pillows, Stiles sits down in one of them and all the while he doesn't stop talking. "Scott isn't actually dumb, y'know. Before this whole thing came crashing down on us he got pretty decent grades. He'd just too good a person to see the evil in others most of the time. Sometimes I think he's got no sense of self-preservation while animals are supposed to be all about instincts and survival. But that just means his feelings for Allison are so strong he can't help the wishful-thinking reaching into her family as well. Scott's a great friend, but he's only been a werewolf a few months, dude. For you, it's all you've ever known. And you're not actually a bad person, no matter how misunderstood you are, how your actions come across as. You and Scott, at the end of the line you want the exact same thing: not let people get hurt and end this. And The Stiles here is gonna will willingly do what needs to be done and then you guys can make up and hug it out or whatever."

Ignoring the completely silent snorting Derek tried to hide at the mention of "The Stiles", Stiles continued, "I want this because I want to be able to protect Scott; from himself, probably, _definitely_. To protect my dad—FYI, he's so gonna kill me for losing my humanity before I even lost my virginity, no kidding. To protect my friends. I want to not be the weakest link, a damsel in distress, a liability to the rest of the group, to you all. Don't get me wrong, I _love_ being human, being human's great and I'm an awesome human, the best!" He stretches his arms to the max above his head and intertwines his fingers.

"I'm not doing this because all the cool kids on the block think its _in_. Nor am I doing this just because I've always, always since the beginning, thought Lycanthropy's freaking awesome—because fuck, it _is_ mind-blowing—but because it will give me what I need to keep the people I care about a bit safer. I'll actually have the physical power to help in bad situations. Not just... scramble away after I've done my detective-thing part and then hope everything ends well."

Stiles huffs, content with himself and struggles with his pillow collection once more. Then he pointedly looks at Derek, his face a brick wall of seriousness and says, "Besides, you totally need me in your pack, dude. You lack organization. Severely."

Derek settles against the headboard next to him. "You going to be my second-in-command? Strategist General?" Derek almost, _almost_ chuckles right there, Stiles knows.

"Ooohh, you can count on it. Imma gonna keep you and your delinquent trio of Betas in line." His tongue does some freaky dance during the cocky talking and Stiles almost embarrasses himself by gagging on his own spit. What would be, would be. What's one more scene of self-humiliation in a lifetime of those? Stiles is working on getting into the Guinness with that, actually. Ha!

" _Me_ too," Derek says and his incredibly authoritarian brow goes up. Stiles knows its an interrogative but maybe Derek needs not only a shrink but also some revising in the whole correct-way-to-punctuate-your-sentences business. That one Stiles can take care of, no sweat.

"You most of all, sourface."

"Shut up."

Stiles guffaws because thank the Lord for some semblance of normalcy. And because apparently lazing around on his bed with Derek is 25% creepy, 75% totally okay with him and _that_ is what's wrong with Stiles in the first place, these mismatched and inappropriate percentage distributions.

And because his normal life and normal days have gone to shit way back in some (not so) distant past, Stiles shoulder-bumps Derek's own shoulder and asks, "You hungry?"

They order Indian (Stiles learns that Derek really loves spicy food and no, it doesn't ruin his flair) and watch some ancient movie that's been taken under siege by cobwebs and after that Derek sits by the computer going over Stiles' saved research while Stiles sprawls on the bed.

Stiles breaks in a yawn and goes to get his PSP from where its tempting him from the surface of the desk. He places a hand on the back of the chair a looks above Derek's shoulder, skimming over the lines he's so interested in reading. "So... it's always gotta be on the side? The bite, I mean."

"Not really, no," Derek tells him without taking his eyes off of the monitor. "Why, you have some particular place in mind?"

"Mmnnoo, just. Your uncle was going for my wrist that one time."

The wheels of the chair make a familiar rolling slide through the floor and this time Derek turns around, not just his head but his whole body, giving Stiles all of his attention. "You want it there?"

Stiles shakes his head. "Wherever, 'f it's all the same."

Derek rises up and grabs his face with both hands.

"Uu, what are you—"

"You stole a few things from me. I'm going to steal them back, if that's okay," Derek says and he's enjoying this creepy-ass atmosphere too much, what with that bleach-white toothy grin of his.

"And if it's not okay, well..." he adds, leaving the completion in the air.

Derek is totally finding Stiles' squirming the funniest thing ever, Stiles can tell. Freaking beast.

"Stole? Me? _What_? Dude. Are you talking about... what I _think_ you're talking about? Because _that_ , let me tell you, is called the kiss of life, my friend. You were... not very much alive, I gave you some life back and _kazam_! You became fully alive again. Awesome, right? My very own Frankenstein."

"Kiss of life. Really."

"Yes, kiss of life! And question marks, by the way! But yeah, _kiss of life_. D'you want me to say it in another language, Derek? Latin would be cool but I'm still not fluent yet so how about Spanish? Spanish worked on Jackson before. _Beso de vida_."

Derek kisses him then, no warnings. And Stiles, who was expecting to get that mouth on his throat—not ripping it out as it had been so many times promised, but grabbing a literal bite—ends up with said mouth eating at his own lips in a very, very pleasurable manner.

This was pay-back. Totally. Derek was making fun of him, the jerkoff.

A gargled sound leaves Stiles' throat, the un-sexiest thing to ever grace anyone's eardrums, and his eyes slip harshly shut when a tongue pries his lips apart and strokes Stiles' own tongue.

Pulling back, Derek murmurs, "This is going to hurt," against Stiles' moist mouth before fingering the collar of Stiles' _Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles_ shirt down and diving his enlarged fangs into the tender meat surrounding Stiles' clavicula. Stiles spasms and blurts his scream of pain out in multiple gulps with a fist smothering some of the volume.

As he feels Derek's teeth retreat and a couple of droplets of blood cobbling at the holes in his flesh Stiles tries really hard not to think about the long, deep, detailed, abnormal conversation he's gonna have to have with his dad come morning. Guh. So dead.

Now. Derek. About that kiss...

 

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't start this story with turning Stiles in mind but when he started teasing Derek... well, I just had to follow through. I don't dislike reading fiction where Stiles goes wolf (if it's well written, of course,) but I usually prefer him in his natural human state. So, my apologies if there are readers who get 'turned off' by werewolf!Stiles, I know there are people who can't stand the idea. (:


End file.
